the lengthy incarceration of irregular migrants
could soon be the new norm.
August 22, 2025
By Anthony Faiola,
Elinda Labropoulou and
AMYGDALEZA, Greece — Decrying an “invasion” of migrants — and praising the crackdown in the United States under President Donald Trump — Greek authorities are unfurling one of the most radical plans in Europe to stamp out unauthorized arrivals.
The new Greek “model” is playing out behind a 10-foot fence topped with barbed wire on the edge of metropolitan Athens, where imprisoned migrants describe conditions befitting an Aegean Alcatraz. Black-clad guards patrol the perimeter of the detention center here, where migrants recently rescued at sea are treated like criminals, according to human rights lawyers.
As Greece acts to halt an uptick in unauthorized arrivals, called irregular migration in Europe, Latin America and elsewhere, migrants landing from the North African coast without authorization since mid-July have faced summary incarceration during a three-month suspension of the right to asylum, a period that authorities say could be extended and that critics call a violation of international treaties and conventions.
Rescued migrants are being housed inside makeshift quarters in metal containers, migrants and lawyers say.
Insects crawl near discolored mattresses in units housing as many as 10 migrants. Toilets have no lids and some, no doors. Air conditioners are breaking down at the height of the Greek summer, when temperatures regularly surge into the 90s, according to interviews and videos of the facility shared by migrants.
Greek officials declined a request to visit the detention camp and did not respond to a request for comment on the alleged conditions.
“It is a very difficult life,” said a 31-year-old Yemeni man in one facility who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he fears retribution from the authorities.
For Greece, a gateway into the 27-member European Union, the lengthy incarceration of irregular arrivals could soon be the new norm. Under a sweeping law introduced as deterrence — and likely to be approved in the coming weeks — migrants could again apply for asylum. But instead of being freed into open camps where they would have some ability to come and go while their cases are adjudicated — as happened previously — they would be held inside closed prisons like the one in Amygdaleza.
Successful applicants would be released. But those rejected — a rate now running at more than 50 percent — would confront a hard choice: voluntarily deportation or potential jail sentences of two to five years, as well as fines of up to 10,000 euros ($11,600), if convicted of illegal entry and stay.
Greek officials are citing Trump’s aggressive immigration crackdown as one inspiration.
“I think that the policy of President Trump is a good policy,” said Thanos Plevris, Greece’s new migration minister, adding that it would have been “very difficult” for the Greek government to roll out its new plan if the U.S. and other countries in Europe weren’t also taking a harder line. “Europe is saying enough is enough.”
Migrants stand behind a fence after being gathered by Greek coast guard officers in Lavrio last month. (Aris Messinis/AFP/Getty Images)
“It is a very difficult life,” said a 31-year-old Yemeni man in one facility who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he fears retribution from the authorities.
For Greece, a gateway into the 27-member European Union, the lengthy incarceration of irregular arrivals could soon be the new norm. Under a sweeping law introduced as deterrence — and likely to be approved in the coming weeks — migrants could again apply for asylum. But instead of being freed into open camps where they would have some ability to come and go while their cases are adjudicated — as happened previously — they would be held inside closed prisons like the one in Amygdaleza.
Successful applicants would be released. But those rejected — a rate now running at more than 50 percent — would confront a hard choice: voluntarily deportation or potential jail sentences of two to five years, as well as fines of up to 10,000 euros ($11,600), if convicted of illegal entry and stay.
Greek officials are citing Trump’s aggressive immigration crackdown as one inspiration.
“I think that the policy of President Trump is a good policy,” said Thanos Plevris, Greece’s new migration minister, adding that it would have been “very difficult” for the Greek government to roll out its new plan if the U.S. and other countries in Europe weren’t also taking a harder line. “Europe is saying enough is enough.”
Migrants stand behind a fence after being gathered by Greek coast guard officers in Lavrio last month. (Aris Messinis/AFP/Getty Images)
A change in direction
Across the West, countries are issuing a clarion call to migrants who enter without authorization: You will find no sanctuary here.Europe’s pendulum began swinging to the right a decade ago, after more than a million Syrians and other asylum seekers fleeing war surged into the continent. Railing against then-German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s willingness to open her nation’s doors, several countries, including Hungary and Austria, imposed curbs, crackdowns and caps aimed at deterrence.
Today, with the notable exception of liberal-led Spain, which has adopted a more welcoming policy on migration and reaped economic rewards in the process, European countries, though largely willing to accept millions of White, Christian Ukrainians, are increasingly hostile to migration.
Germany has done an about-face, launching new border patrols and hosting a summit of European nations in the Bavarian Alps last month to back stricter migration rules. Last month, the lower house in the Netherlands approved two laws that reduce the length of temporary asylum permits, suspend new ones and restrict family reunification.
“It’s a change in direction” on migration, said Jasmijn Slootjes, deputy director of the Migration Policy Institute Europe, a think tank. “What is different now is that it’s across so many countries. ”
Migrants disembark from a cargo ship to board a smaller boat in Lavrio before being transferred last month. (Aris Messinis/AFP/Getty Images)
Struggling with low deportation rates — only about 1 in every 4.5 rejected asylum seekers across the E.U. are actually repatriated — the bloc is on a mission to make it easier and faster to return rejected asylum seekers, or to bar applicants from entering in the first place.
Unlike refugees who are entitled to asylum because they are fleeing war, famine or other life-threatening circumstances, irregular arrivals are those migrants seeking better economic circumstances without being in imminent danger. But the lines can be blurry.
There are no systemic raids happening in Europe — yet. But in an echo of Trump’s deal with El Salvador, European officials are increasingly backing the idea of holding migrants awaiting repatriation or asylum decisions outside the bloc’s borders. Many E.U. nations have embraced Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s effort to set up two detention centers in Albania to process asylum seekers offshore. That effort has been stymied by legal challenges, but Italian officials say it could become more practical after new E.U. migration rules come into effect next year.
In an interview, Plevris, the Greek migration minister, said he and his European counterparts had recently discussed creating holding centers in Libya — where human rights groups and U.N. agencies have accused local authorities of unlawful killings, sexual abuse and torture of migrants.
Greece for years has sought to combat waves of migration, with its coast guard accused of illegally deploying pushbacks and failing to prevent migrant tragedies at sea. But its new migration law — unveiled last month following a sudden increase of arrivals on its southern island of Crete — seeks to enshrine its “keep out” message.
A migrant who arrived recently in Crete drinks water while being held under guard at a temporary shelter in Agia on Tuesday. (Giannis Angelakis/AP)
Shipped to a prison
In a cavernous exhibition hall on Crete — Greece’s largest island, resting 180 miles from the North African coast — dingy mattresses were piled in a corner on a recent visit.A few weeks ago, the makeshift center overflowed with hundreds of migrants after arrivals began to surge in the late spring. Arrivals to Crete and the smaller island of Gavdos during the first seven months of the year climbed above 10,000 — a fourfold increase compared with the same period last year.
Migrants arrived from the lawless coast of eastern Libya, in rickety boats large and small. Many hailed from Egypt, Bangladesh and Pakistan and were fleeing poverty, with relatively weak claims to asylum, according to Greek authorities. But human rights advocates say that others, escaping war and violence in Sudan and Yemen, probably had far stronger cases.
With significantly fewer migrants arriving, the processing center on Crete has stretches without residents. The migrants who arrived on or after July 14 — when Greece’s suspension of asylum claims came into force — are quickly being shipped to the Amygdaleza prison near Athens or another in northern Greece.
In addition, Athens dispatched three navy ships to international waters off the coast of Libya. Arrivals have cratered to around 157 migrants in total since July 25.
Julia Zelvenska, head of legal support and litigation at the European Council on Refugees and Exiles, an alliance of nongovernmental organizations, said the suspension of asylum — which Greece also did for one month in 2020 — violated the Geneva Conventions, as well as the European Union’s charter on human rights, which recognizes the right to asylum.
Arguing that most arriving migrants do not qualify for asylum, Greek authorities deny that.
UNHCR, the United Nations’ refugee agency, expressed “serious concern” over the Greek suspension of asylum.
“The right to seek asylum is a fundamental human right, enshrined in international, European and national law, and applies to everyone regardless of how or where they arrive in a country,” it said in a statement.
The Greek island of Crete is a popular tourist destination. (Ilir Tsouko/For The Washington Post)
“On a national level, we see more and more people on the streets, of a population that didn’t used to be here [including] women with headscarves,” said Konstantinos Thomadakis, an Orthodox priest at the church of St. Lukas in Chania. “And the profile of those coming are young men from 18 to 35. It makes us wonder, why are they coming? It’s illegal entry into our country.”
But Eleni Zervoudaki, a deputy mayor and local liaison to the makeshift camp, wrestled with the government’s decision to suspend asylum. She said she grew to know some migrants during their stay, including a “good man” from Sudan who was fleeing a brutal war.
“We are all human beings,” Zervoudaki said. “If we were in their position, we would do the same.”
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The Amygdaleza migrant detention center, north of Athens. (Ilir Tsouko/For The Washington Post)
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Eleni Zervoudaki, a deputy mayor and local liaison to the makeshift migrant camp in Crete. (Ilir Tsouko/For The Washington Post)
In the shadow of distant mountains on the Attica Peninsula north of Athens, the fenced-in Amygdaleza migrant detention facility opened in 2012. Legally, unauthorized arrivals can be held for up to 18 months. But lawyers say in recent years, new arrivals, once registered as asylum seekers, were moved relatively quickly to less-restrictive camps.
For the new residents of Amygdaleza, however, that is no longer the case.
Their stays here could stretch into years if the new law is passed and rejected applicants refuse to return home. Lawyers call the policy impractical, saying Greece simply doesn’t have the capacity to jail so many migrants.
The migrant from Yemen, who said he fled a conflict zone between the government and Houthi rebels, said he and other migrants were dismayed to find out that they had risked their lives, and life savings, to reach Greece, only to find out they were not permitted to make asylum claims.
“I thought that they would [make] me stay for three to five days and then release me,” he said in a phone interview. “I had no idea. I was surprised. I want to leave. I don’t want to stay in this prison.”
El Chamaa reported from Beirut. Ellen Francis in Brussels contributed to this report.
Why are they coming?
On Crete, a sprawling island of olive groves, crystalline beaches, and hotels and restaurants that depend on tourism, many residents appeared to back the new government deterrence policy. Some feared the recent migrant wave would scare off tourists, as happened when Syrians overwhelmed Greece’s eastern islands a decade ago. Others called it a question of law and order — as well as preservation of culture in the cradle of Western civilization.“On a national level, we see more and more people on the streets, of a population that didn’t used to be here [including] women with headscarves,” said Konstantinos Thomadakis, an Orthodox priest at the church of St. Lukas in Chania. “And the profile of those coming are young men from 18 to 35. It makes us wonder, why are they coming? It’s illegal entry into our country.”
But Eleni Zervoudaki, a deputy mayor and local liaison to the makeshift camp, wrestled with the government’s decision to suspend asylum. She said she grew to know some migrants during their stay, including a “good man” from Sudan who was fleeing a brutal war.
“We are all human beings,” Zervoudaki said. “If we were in their position, we would do the same.”
In the shadow of distant mountains on the Attica Peninsula north of Athens, the fenced-in Amygdaleza migrant detention facility opened in 2012. Legally, unauthorized arrivals can be held for up to 18 months. But lawyers say in recent years, new arrivals, once registered as asylum seekers, were moved relatively quickly to less-restrictive camps.
For the new residents of Amygdaleza, however, that is no longer the case.
Their stays here could stretch into years if the new law is passed and rejected applicants refuse to return home. Lawyers call the policy impractical, saying Greece simply doesn’t have the capacity to jail so many migrants.
The migrant from Yemen, who said he fled a conflict zone between the government and Houthi rebels, said he and other migrants were dismayed to find out that they had risked their lives, and life savings, to reach Greece, only to find out they were not permitted to make asylum claims.
“I thought that they would [make] me stay for three to five days and then release me,” he said in a phone interview. “I had no idea. I was surprised. I want to leave. I don’t want to stay in this prison.”
El Chamaa reported from Beirut. Ellen Francis in Brussels contributed to this report.
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